1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to wagering games. More particularly, the present invention relates to a group of games where there is one hand or value commonly called the dealer hand and at least one, and possibly more than one, hand or value commonly called a player hand. These games may allow for a Reverse Bet that the dealer hand will beat a specific player hand, a Push Bet that the dealer hand will push with a specific player hand, or both of these wagers.
The present invention includes, but is not limited to, games where the hands are made up of tokens that are divided into two or more sub-groups. These games may include Pai Gow Poker, Pai Gow Tiles, and Thirteen-Card Poker, as well as variations of these games.
2. Background
Many wagering games are known in the prior art. Many of them involve the parties each being given a hand, which consists of a group of cards, tiles, or other gaming pieces. The present invention involves games where one of these hands is designated the dealer hand, the player/dealer hand, or the bank hand. In addition, a number of players can each have their own player hand or there can be a single player hand and more than one player can wager on each hand. Players wager on a hand and the outcome of the wager is decided by comparing the player hand to the dealer hand according to a criterion specified by the rules of the game.
In some of these games, the gaming pieces are divided up into two or more sub-groups, which are often also called hands. To avoid confusion, these sub-groups will be called sub-hands, while the larger groups will be called hands.
A banking game is a game where the casino plays an active role in the games and makes a profit by collecting losing wagers from the players. In jurisdictions where banking games are allowed, typically the casino or the establishment operating the game (“the house”) funds the dealer hand. The casino pays all winning wagers, the casino collects all losing wagers, and a casino employee makes all playing decisions involving the dealer hand, typically according to a set of playing rules.
In jurisdictions where banking games are not allowed, players take turns acting as the dealer. In some other jurisdictions, one or more players may be agent(s) of the house, but other players may also take their turn to be the dealer. In all these cases, each time the game is played, a player is designated as the player/dealer. The player/dealer puts up a wager and receives a hand. All other players also make wagers and receive hands. These other players try to beat the hand of the player/dealer. If the player wins, the player is paid from the player/dealer's wager, so long as there is sufficient money to pay the player. If the player loses, the player loses his/her wager to the player/dealer, so long as the player/dealer's wager was sufficient to cover the player's wager. Usually there are some circumstances that are defined as a push. When a push occurs, no money changes hands.
There are many variations of how the player/dealer's wager is funded. Two or more parties may share in funding the wager. Two or more parties may make separate wagers, where the second or third wager only comes into play when wagers equal to the size of the first player/dealer wager have been settled.
To clarify this discussion, the dealer hand will refer to the hand that others are playing against, no matter what the source of funding. The dealer hand may be funded by the casino or a player/dealer. The other hands will be referred to as player hands.
There are many variations of how the player hands are funded. Sometimes only one player wagers on each hand. Other times more than one player can wager on a hand. Often a player can wager on more than one hand. For the purposes of this invention, the source of the funds and the makeup of the wagers are not significant.
Pai Gow Tiles (also known as simply “Pai Gow”) is played with a set of tiles with markings. Each player makes a wager and then receives four tiles. In addition, another four-tile hand is given to the dealer.
The player divides the four tiles into a pair of two-tile sub-hands. The tiles in the dealer hand are also divided into a pair of two-tile sub-hands. Each two-tile player sub-hand is compared to one of the two-tile house or player/dealer sub-hands according to a ranking scheme for the two-tile combinations. The higher-ranked player sub-hand is compared to the higher-ranked dealer sub-hand, and the two lower-ranked sub-hands are compared. If both of the player's sub-hands beat both of the dealer sub-hands, the player wins an amount equal to his/her wager. If both of the dealer sub-hands are ranked higher than or equal to the player's sub-hands, then the dealer wins. If one sub-hand is ranked higher and one is ranked lower, then it is a push and no money changes hands.
Pai Gow Poker is similar to Pai Gow, but it is played with a deck of playing cards, usually with one joker. In Pai Gow Poker, each player is dealt a hand of seven cards, and the dealer is also dealt a hand of seven cards. Each party divides his cards into two sub-hands. This process is known as “setting the hand.” One sub-hand, known as the “front hand” contains two cards, while the other, the “back hand,” contains five cards. These sub-hands are evaluated using standard Poker rankings. The five-card sub-hand can have any Poker rank from five of a kind to a hand with no pair. The two-card sub-hand can only have a pair or be ranked by its card values. Two-card sub-hands cannot count as straights or flushes.
The only restriction on setting the hands is that the five-card sub-hand must have a higher rank than the two-card sub-hand. A player cannot, for example, put a pair in the two-card sub-hand, unless the five-card sub-hand has a hand with at least the same pair.
Chinese (13-Card) Poker is played with a standard 52-card deck. Up to four players can play. Each player receives 13 cards, face down, one at a time, in rotation. Standard Poker rankings are used. Each hand is divided into three sub-hands of three, five, and five cards. Both five-card hands must rank higher than the three-card sub-hand. The sub-hands are arranged with the three-card sub-hand designated as the front hand, the weaker of the two five-card sub-hands as the middle hand, and the strongest of the two five-card sub-hands as the back hand. The back hand must rank higher or equal to the middle hand, and the middle hand must rank higher than the front hand. Straights and flushes do not count in the front hand.
While 13-Card Poker can be played without a dealer, the present invention applies to the version of it where one hand is designated as the dealer hand. To determine the winner, each of a player's three sub-hands is compared to the corresponding dealer sub-hand. The two front hands are compared, the two middle hands are compared, and the two back hands are compared. If at least two of the player's sub-hands rank higher than the corresponding dealer sub-hands, the player wins. Otherwise, the player loses.
All of these games share a common feature when deciding who wins. When two sub-hands are compared, if they have the same value (a “copy”), this situation is treated the same as if the dealer had a higher value. Copies are treated as wins for the dealer.
In all games with at least one player hand and a dealer hand, there is a wager that a player hand will beat the dealer hand, which will be called a Normal Bet. In the traditional forms of most of these games, this is the only wager available.
Baccarat, which is traditionally played with only one player hand, has two other wagers. You can wager that the dealer hand will beat the player hand, and you can wager whether the two hands will tie.
In U.S. patent application Ser. Nos. 11/254,563 and 10/947,188, similar wagers have been added to the other games in the field of the present invention. Unlike Baccarat, these games can have more than one player hand. So for the present invention, the player who makes these wagers must select a particular hand for each wager. One wager, called a Reverse Bet, is that the dealer hand will beat a particular player hand. The other wager, called a Push Bet, is that the dealer hand will push with a particular player hand. A push is an outcome where no money would change hands on a Normal Bet.
Pushes in Pai Gow Poker and Pai Gow Tiles do not occur on ties, but rather when one dealer sub-hand wins and the other loses. In games with sub-hands, sub-hands with the same value are treated as a win for the dealer.
In Pai Gow Poker, the dealer's five-card sub-hand is compared to the player's five-card sub-hand, and the two-card sub-hands are compared. If one dealer sub-hand beats the player's sub-hand and the other loses, it is a push.
In Pai Gow Tiles, the higher-ranked of the dealer sub-hands is compared to the higher-ranked of the player sub-hands. The two lower-ranked sub-hands are compared to each other. If one dealer sub-hand beats the player's sub-hand and the other loses, it is a push.
In all these games, there is no minimum requirement for a hand value in order to be allowed to win a Reverse Bet or a Push Bet. In all games with sub-hands, there is no minimum hand value required to win a Normal Bet.
While these games have been very successful, there are some limitations to them. First, all of them pay even money. Other than a bonus for a Blackjack, the player wins exactly the amount that he wagers. Some players would like to have the chance to win a larger amount. It is more exciting to have the chance to win $20 or $1,000 on a $10 wager, than to be limited to a win of $10 or $15. The normal dealer advantage is not large enough to fund these larger payoffs. While an extra bet or side bet could be introduced for larger payoffs, it would be desirable to find a mechanism to increase the dealer advantage on the standard wager to allow larger payoffs or bonuses to be paid. Additionally, some casinos might just wish to increase the dealer advantage on the standard wager without paying any bonuses.
Another limitation of these games involves the Reverse Bet and Push Bet. Since the dealer hand typically has a built-in advantage over the player hands, a Reverse Bet would not normally pay even money. Typically a player would wager $10 to win $9. Not only could this be unpopular with players, but it makes it more complicated to settle wagers. The complexity of settling this wager makes it more difficult to calculate the exact amount, slows down the game, and can introduce errors.
Typically, the Push Bet will not pay even money. In one embodiment, it pays $13 for each $10 wagered. Again, with payoffs like this, it becomes complex to settle wagers.
It would be desirable to find a mechanism for adjusting the dealer edge for new wagers. This adjustment should be able to apply to just a specific wager or to all wagers in the game.
In recent years, a number of new games have been introduced with a “qualifier” for either the player hand or dealer hand. This qualifier is a minimum hand a designated party (either the player or the dealer) must have for the normal method of choosing winners to be used. When the designated party does not have a qualifying hand, an alternative method of deciding wagers comes into play. Depending on the game, when the minimum hand is not achieved, the payouts may be limited, certain bets will be treated as pushes, one party may automatically lose, or one party may only have the ability to push or lose, but not to win.
In all these games, the qualifier has always been a part of the game. The games were not first played without a qualifier, with a qualifier added later. The practice of adding a qualifier to games that have been played without one is not well known to those of ordinary skill in the art.
In Caribbean Stud (U.S. Pat. No. 5,725,216), a player can make two wagers called an ante and a raise. The player and the dealer each end up with a five-card Poker hand. Then it is determined if the dealer hand qualifies. If the dealer hand is at least an Ace-King, when valued as a Poker hand, the hand qualifies and the player may win or lose his two wagers. If the dealer hand is weaker than an Ace-King, then the hand does not qualify, and the player wins even money on the ante wager and the raise wager is a push.
In Three Card Poker (U.S. Pat. No. 5,685,774), the players and the dealer again can make an ante bet and a raise. They each receive a three-card hand. In this game, the dealer must have at least a Queen-high Poker hand to qualify. If the dealer qualifies, then the player may win or lose both wagers. If the dealer does not qualify, the player wins even money on the ante wager and the raise wager is a push.
In some variations of Easy Poker (U.S. Pat. No. 6,332,614) there is a minimum qualifier for the dealer hand. In Easy Poker, a player hand is compared to the better of two dealer hands. In one variation, if the dealer does not have at least a pair, the dealer automatically loses. In another version, if the dealer does not have at least a pair of sixes, the dealer can lose or push, but cannot win. Other variations have different minimum hands.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,050,569 introduces a game that is similar to Pai Gow Tiles, but played with cards. In one variation, the player must have a minimum hand to win. However, in that variation, there is no dealer hand.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,105,964 introduces a game with both a dealer hand and a qualifier hand. The player must beat the qualifier hand in order to have the option to compete against the dealer hand. There is no pre-specified minimum hand that is required to qualify.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,135,454 discloses a version of Baccarat with Jokers and where there can be more than one player hand. No Reverse Bet or Push Bet is disclosed.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,409,174 introduces a game where players play a Blackjack game and then a Poker game. In the Poker game, the player must make a minimum hand to qualify, but is not playing against a dealer hand. The player is paid based on the value of his hand.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,511,071 introduces a number of versions of Pan 9 with minimum hand requirements for the players to win. These versions do not involve sub-hands, Reverse Bets, or Push Bets.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,044,468 introduces a game where at least one player and the dealer are dealt a two-card starting hand. If the two-card hand does not meet a qualifying value, the game does not continue.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,147,227 introduces another new card game where the dealer must have a qualifying hand in some circumstances.
The prior art discloses games with a minimum hand required to win, but not for Reverse Bets and Push Bets. It also does not disclose a minimum hand for games where gaming pieces are divided into sub-hands.